Rise and Fall of an Information Technology Outsourcing Program: a qualitative Analysis of a Troubled Corporate Initiative

Considering qualitative methodologies of outsourcing diffusion study. 
Beverakis et 
al. (2009) offer one of the few qualitative outsourcing quasi-diffusion studies. This study is also 
noteworthy for its grounded theory methodology in the modes of Strauss and Corbin (1998) and 
Charmaz (2006). The researchers relied on semi-structured interviews, document analysis, and 
field observations over a six-month period as executives at ComputerInc (pseudonym) 
determined which areas of its IT operations were best suited for outsourcing. Additionally, the 

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researchers suggested that further qualitative, grounded theory study of “how” ITO strategies 
diffuse within an organization would be valuable: 
The impact of personal opinions and bias could prove to be an impediment to the success 
of such of an offshore sourcing project. A study of this impact could prove extremely 
valuable and make a significant contribution to the offshore sourcing field, in both theory 
and practice. Additionally, the principal researcher saw very little questioning of the 
decisions made by the executive management team. The decisions were simply accepted 
as fact even though many of the people involved had first-hand, on-the-ground 
experience with the roles being sent offshore. It may be that this could be the reason 
behind why a number of the employees did not fully comprehend the organisation’s [sic] 
reasons for going offshore. The authors believe management gathering ideas from those 
directly involved would be an extremely interesting area for research. Other limitations 
include the potential opportunity for the interviewees to mislead the researcher or push a 
point of view, the relatively brief time-frame in which the study was conducted and the 
organisation [sic] to which the tasks were outsourced being outside the scope of the 
study. (p. 45) 
I address many of these research opportunities in this study. 
While Beverakis et al. (2009) conducted their research from within the company they 
studied, they were not actual employees of that organization. Among the other related studies 
discussed in Chapter One, the second author of Hong and O’s research (2009) was an insider 
during the initial research phases. Although able to observe and participate in a number of formal 
and informal activities related to the case, the authors’ exact role is not disclosed in the research. 

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While their study included only ten interviewees, it did benefit from the inclusion of two former 
contractors in their data sample. 
The locus of Clott’s research (2007) differed; each of the nine interviewees worked for 
different firms versus a case study at a single organization. Additionally, Clott’s work focused on 
the organizational scanning and learning performed by project managers versus a grounded 
theory of how their respective outsourcing projects began, evolved, and implemented. Like Clott 
(2007), Lacity and Rottman (2009) conducted semi-structured interviews with project managers 
from multiple organizations. However, the latter study was broader and included sixty-seven 
individuals from twenty-five companies. All except one of the companies in the Lacity and 
Rottman (2009) study were U.S. firms—one was located in the U.K.